HDD (Hard Disk Drive) recorders, which are high capacity record media, have been put to practical use as recorders capable of recording television (hereinafter, referred to as TV) programs broadcasted. Having recording capacities from several hundred gigabytes to one terabyte, the HDD recorders can record the TV programs broadcasted for long hours. In addition, with its excellent random retrieval performance, the HDD recorders have started being used popularly at home.
When connected to networks, the HDD recorders can receive an electric program guide (EPG) and thereby, by using program information obtained from the electric program guide, can display broadcast stations, broadcast times, brief descriptions of contents of the TV programs and the like on a screen of TV set connected to the HDD recorder. A user can program a recording apparatus such as the HDD recorder or the like, which is built in the TV set or externally connected thereto, to video-record or sound-record a TV program by selecting it from the program guide displayed. Accordingly, the electric program guide allows for a simple operation to program recording of the TV program without complicated operations.
On the other hand, mobile devices such as mobile phones, PDAs, notebook computers, PHSs and the like having functions to receive broadcast programs and to record/play/view them have been suggested, including a mobile electronic apparatus having a function as a recorder (see Patent Document 1).
The recorder described in Patent Document 1 (hereinafter, referred to as a conventional art) is constituted as a broadcast program programming system having functions as follows:
(1) calculating a necessary recording capacity needed for each broadcast program to be broadcasted, by using an average recording bit rate of each recording mode and a broadcast time, and displaying recordability of each broadcast program determined based on a comparison of a remaining recording capacity of a recording unit and the above necessary recording capacity;(2) calculating an unreserved remaining recording capacity by subtracting a reserved necessary recording capacity from the remaining recording capacity of the recording unit and determining recordability by comparing the unreserved recordable capacity and the necessary recording capacity of each broadcast program to be broadcasted;(3) showing a recording mode of a best quality for each program to be broadcasted in the program guide if there are recording modes capable of recording as a result of determination on recordability, or displaying “unrecordable” for each broadcast program in the program guide if there is no recording mode capable of recording;(4) displaying “unprogrammable” or “cannot record all” for each broadcast program in the program guide if a plurality of broadcast programs, up to a simultaneously recordable number, can be recorded but there is a broadcast program which cannot be programmed for recording in addition to broadcast programs already registered for recording which will be broadcasted at the same hour on the same broadcast date because of a limitation on the simultaneously recordable number; and(5) displaying the result of the determination on recordability of each the broadcast program to be broadcasted in the program guide by color coding or by adding predetermined identifiers.
Patent Document 1 also describes about a remote control device, in the above manner, for determining recordability of the broadcast programs and for displaying the result of the determination on recordability in the program guide.